You find this type of doubter everywhere—­and especially in India where official rank is but the guinea stamp and gold is brass without it.

Great, in the Grand Stand, was General Miltiades Murger.  Beside Mrs. Dearman, most charming of hostesses, he sate, in the stage of avuncular affection, and told her that if the Judges knew their business his hunter would win the Hunter-Class first prize and be “Best Horse in the Show” too.

As to his charger, his hack, his trapper, his suitable-for-polo ponies, his carriage-horses he did not worry; they might or might not “do something,” but his big and beautiful hunter—­well, he hoped the Judges knew their business, that was all.

“Are you going to show him in the ring yourself, General?” asked Mrs. Dearman.

“And leave your side?” replied the great man in manner most avuncular and with little reassuring pats upon the lady’s hand.  “No, indeed.  I am going to remain with you and watch Rissaldar-Major Shere Singh ride him for me.  Finest horseman in India.  Good as myself.  Yes, I hope the Judges for Class XIX know their business.  I imported that horse from Home and he cost me over six thousand rupees.”

Meanwhile, it may be mentioned, evil passions surged in the soul of Mr. John Robin Ross-Ellison as he watched the General, and witnessed his avuncular pattings and confidential whisperings.  Mr. Ross-Ellison had lunched with the Dearmans, had brought Mrs. Dearman to the Horse Show, and was settling down, after she had welcomed her guests, to a delightful, entrancing, and thrillful afternoon with her—­to be broken but while he showed his horse—­when he had been early and utterly routed by the General.  The heart of Mr. Ross-Ellison was sore within him, for he loved Mrs. Dearman very devotedly and respectfully.

He was always devotedly in love with some one, and she was always a nice good woman.

When she, or he, left the station, his heart died within him, life was hollow, and his mouth filled with Dead Sea fruit.  The world he loved so much would turn to dust and ashes at his touch.  After a week or so his heart would resurrect, life would become solid, and his mouth filled with merry song.  He would fall in love afresh and the world went very well then.

At present he loved Mrs. Dearman—­and hated General Miltiades Murger, who had sent him for a programme and taken his seat beside Mrs. Dearman.  There was none on the other side of her—­Mr. Ross-Ellison had seen to that—­and his prudent foresight had turned and rent him, for he could not plant a chair in the narrow gangway.

He wandered disconsolately away and instinctively sought the object of the one permanent and unwavering love of his life—­his mare “Zuleika,” late of Balkh.

Zuleika was more remarkable for excellences of physique than for those of mind and character.  To one who knew her not, she was a wild beast, fitter for a cage in a Zoo than for human use, a wild-eyed, screaming man-eating she-devil; and none knew her save Mr. John Robin Ross-Ellison, who had bought her unborn. (He knew her parents.)